Privacy & Security

Hallmark Cards PLC (“Hallmark”, “we”, “us”, “our”) is the data controller and we take your privacy very seriously. This Privacy Policy describes how Hallmark uses personal information regarding its customers. We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Officer under registration number Z9720238. This Privacy Policy describes how Hallmark uses personal information regarding its customers.

This Privacy Policy should be read alongside and is subject to the hallmark.co.uk (“the Website”) Terms of Use (click here to view the terms of use) and explains how we may use and protect your personal data that you give us when you use this Website. This Privacy Policy, together with the Terms of Use and the Website Terms of Sale, forms the entire agreement between us.

This Privacy Notice explains how we will use your information, including information collected about or from you as a result of your use of any of the websites we operate, including www.hallmark.co.uk, hub.hallmark.co.uk and our Business to Business online store at trade.hallmark.co.uk. It should be read alongside and is subject to the Website Terms of Use and (where applicable) the Website Terms of Sale of each site, which can be viewed in the footer of each site.

If you have questions or concerns about this policy, please contact us before using this Website.

By using the services on the Website and providing your data to us, you understand that your data may be collected and used in some or all of the ways described below. We reserve the right to change this Privacy Policy at any time by updating this page. We will alert you that changes have been made by indicating at the top of the Privacy Policy the date that it was last updated. Please check this page from time to time for changes to make sure you are aware of our latest privacy practices

What Personal Information Does Hallmark Collect?

Personal Information may be requested whenever you choose to use the services on this Website. Such services include newsletters, competitions, “Alert Email”, live chats, and message boards. The type of Personal Information we may collect will be tied to the type of service you are using but may include:

your name and contact information (including e-mail address) and any other details you provide to us;

information you provide when you report a problem with our Website;

records of any correspondence when you contact us.

We also collect:

details of your visits to the Website including, but not limited to, traffic data, location data and communication data and the resources that you access; and

details of your IP address which may be linked to your e-mail address;

We collect this information so that we can administer the website, optimise it for your use and make sure our website runs smoothly. We collect this information on the basis of our legitimate interests (in providing, operating and maintaining the Website.

We also collect, use and share Aggregated Data such as statistical or demographic data for any purpose. Aggregated Data may be derived from your personal data but is not considered personal data in law as this data does not directly or indirectly reveal your identity. For example, we may aggregate your Usage Data to calculate the percentage of users accessing a specific website feature. However, if we combine or connect Aggregated Data with your personal data so that it can directly or indirectly identify you, we treat the combined data as personal data which will be used in accordance with this privacy notice.

We do not collect any Special Categories of Personal Data about you (this includes details about your race or ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, sex life, sexual orientation, political opinions, trade union membership, information about your health and genetic and biometric data). Nor do we collect any information about criminal convictions and offences.

You do not have to provide us with your data but we may not be able to provide our services to you if you do not. This might mean we have to cancel a product or service you have with us but we will notify you if this is the case at the time. Our website may not work properly on your device without details of your visit to our website, which may include your IP address, and you may not be able to access all of its features.

How does Hallmark use Personal Information?

We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you (for example, to process your order and provide you with an online account)

Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests (such as where it is necessary for the administration of our business, our legal risk management and managing the performance of our website).

Where we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation.

Generally we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data other than in relation to sending direct marketing communications to you via email or text message. You have the right to withdraw consent to marketing at any time by contacting us. If you withdraw your consent this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdrew it.

For what purpose will Hallmark use your Personal Information?

We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use your personal data, the types of data that may be involved, and which of the legal bases we rely on to process it. We have also identified what our legitimate interests are where appropriate.

Note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data. Please Contact us if you need details about the specific legal ground we are relying on to process your personal data where more than one ground has been set out in the table below.

To enable you to partake in a prize draw, competition or complete a survey

(a) Identity

(b) Contact

(c) Profile

(d) Usage

(e) Marketing and Communications

(a) Performance of a contract with you

(b) Necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our products/services, to develop them and grow our business)

To administer and protect our business and this website (including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data)

(a) Identity

(b) Contact

(c) Technical

(a) Necessary for our legitimate interests (for running our business, provision of administration and IT services, network security, to prevent fraud and in the context of a business reorganisation or group restructuring exercise)

(b) Necessary to comply with a legal obligation

To deliver relevant website content and advertisements to you and measure or understand the effectiveness of the advertising we serve to you

(a) Identity

(b) Contact

(c) Profile

(d) Usage

(e) Marketing and Communications

(f) Technical

Necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our products/services, to develop them, to grow our business and to inform our marketing strategy)

Opt in: In order to receive e-mail reminders from Hallmark or to receive e-mails from Hallmark regarding new services and products, you must opt in to receive communications from us. When you register on the site you will be given the opportunity to opt in to receiving any communication from us other than that required to process your registration and inform you of progress of subsequent orders.

To opt out of receiving our email newsletters you may use the unsubscribe link on any of our newsletters.

If at any point you decide to opt out we will not be able to send you any more reminders or communications about new products and services.

Who does Hallmark share Personal Information with?

We may share Personal Information with third parties in order to provide you with the services you request. Such third parties will include technology providers, credit card authorisation companies, merchandise distributors, delivery companies and vendors that process our outbound e-mail communications. Your Personal Information is provided to these third parties solely for the purpose of providing you the services you request from us when you request them. Such third parties do not store, retain, access or otherwise use Personal Information.

Hallmark may also disclose your personal data:

In response to a court order, or a request for cooperation from a law enforcement or other government agency; to establish or exercise its legal rights; to defend legal claims; or as otherwise required or permitted by applicable laws and/or regulations;

When Hallmark believes that disclosure is appropriate in connection with efforts to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activity, suspected fraud, or other wrongdoing; to protect and defend the rights, property or safety of Hallmark, its customers, staff, suppliers or others; to comply with applicable law or co-operate with law enforcement; or to enforce its terms or other agreements; and

To prospective or actual buyers in the event that Hallmark sells any of its business or assets to be used in the same way.

Other than as set out above, we will not transfer, disclose, sell, distribute or lease your personal information to third parties unless we have your permission to do so or are otherwise required or permitted to do so by law.

Will Personal Information be transferred outside the EEA?

Sometimes we may transfer your data outside the EEA, however, we will only do so where there are adequate safeguards in place. We may share information within our group including with our head office in Kansas USA. The appropriate safeguards are standard contractual (controller-to-controller) model clauses, approved by the European Commission.

Will I be subject to automated decision taking or profiling?

We do not use your data for automated decision taking or profiling.

How long will Hallmark retain my Personal Information for?

We will only keep your data for as long as is necessary and justified. We take steps to ensure that we only keep the minimum data we need for the purposes of our legitimate interests (in the management of our business and its risks) and in line with our legal obligations.

We will normally keep your information for a maximum of seven years. By law we have to keep basic information about our customers (including Contact, Identity, Financial and Transaction Data) for seven years after they cease being customers for tax purposes.

In some circumstances you can ask us to delete your data: see [Request erasure] below for further information.

In some circumstances we may anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research or statistical purposes in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you.

If you would like more information about how long we retain specific data, you can contact us using the details set out in this policy.

What are my Legal Rights?

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data.

Request access to your personal data

Request correction of your personal data.

Request erasure of your personal data.

Object to processing of your personal data, including to object to direct marketing.

Request restriction of processing your personal data.

Request transfer of your personal data.

Right to withdraw consent

We may provide you with a standard form to help you specify your request. You are not required to use the standard form we provide, but it may be helpful and save time if you do.

If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please Contact uson GDPR@hallmark.com or at our address Hallmark Cards Plc, Dawson Lane, Bradford BD4 6HN

No fee usually required

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

What we may need from you

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

Time limit to respond

We try to respond to all legitimate requests as soon as possible and in any event within one month. Occasionally it may take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated. In such cases it may take up to two further months to process your request.

Does Hallmark use IP Addresses and cookies?

When you enter a site your computer will automatically be issued with a cookie. Cookies are text files that identify your computer to our server. Cookies in themselves do not identify the individual user, just the computer used. Many sites do this whenever a user visits their site in order to track traffic flows.

Cookies themselves only record those areas of the site that have been visited by the computer in question, and for how long. Users have the opportunity to modify their browser preferences to accept all cookies, be notified when a cookie is issued, or to reject all cookies. If you choose to reject all cookies, your site experience may be affected, but you will be able to use the site. Please consult your browser instructions for information on how to modify your choices about cookies.

An IP address is your computer’s address and is a unique identifier, allowing online information to be sent to the right place. For further information about cookies and how to disable them please go to http://www.allaboutcookies.org/.

Hallmark uses IP Addresses and Cookies in limited ways, as follows:

IP Addresses: We use IP addresses to better understand the customer database. We use your IP address to help diagnose problems with our server and to administer our Website. Your IP address is also used to gather broad demographic information such as geographic distribution of our customers. Your IP address may be linked to the Personal Information you provide, depending on how you access the internet.

Cookies: We use cookies to enable our server to recognize that you have visited our website before. They make it easier for you to maintain your preferences on the Website and by seeing how you use the Website, we can tailor the Website around your preferences and measure usability of the Website. Information supplied by cookies can help us to provide you with a better service and assists us to analyse the profiles of our visitors. Currently, Hallmark only makes limited use of cookies for the purpose of delivering content. For instance, cookies may be used to retain your personal preferences, hold session information for a “shopping cart” or save your password so it doesn’t have to be re-entered each time you log in.

We have also set out below the types of cookies we use and the specific purposes for which we use them.

Name of cookie

Owner

Purpose for the cookie

Hotjar

Hotjar

Hotjar is an all-in-one analysis and feedback tool that reveals the online behaviour and feedback of website visitors. Hotjar enables us to improve the website user experience and the website’s overall performance

These web analytics cookies, provided by Microsoft Inc., are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to compile reports and to help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the site, where visitors have come to the site from and the pages they visited.

This is a web analytics service provided by Google Inc which uses cookies to show us how visitors found and explored our site, and how we can enhance their experience. It provides us with information about the behaviour of our visitors (e.g. how long they stayed on the site, the average number of pages viewed) and also tells us how many visitors we have had.

We use a software technology called Web Logging to help us better manage content on our site by informing us what content is effective. Web Logging allows us to track the online movements of Web users. Web Logging is not tied to users’ personally identifiable information.

Does Hallmark track the opening of HTML emails?

We use page tracking in our HTML-based emails to let us know which emails have been opened by the recipients.

Hallmark will never ask you for your personal information in an unsolicited phone call or in an unsolicited email. You will only be asked for your name and email when you initiate the contact and only if your name and email are necessary to correct a service problem.

Links from the Site: If you click away from this site to visit the site of any third party, you may be asked for Personal Information in order to purchase or use products and services offered. These companies have their own privacy and data collection practices. As described above, Hallmark has no responsibility or liability for these independent policies. You should therefore review their privacy policies carefully if you have concerns about how Personal Information may be used.

Contacting Hallmark and complaints

If you have any questions about our Privacy Policy, the practices of this site, or your dealings with this site, or you would like to make a complaint you can contact us at: Customer Care, Hallmark Cards PLC, Dawson Lane, Bradford BD4 6HN or on email: GDPR@hallmark.com

You also have a right to complain about the use of your information to the Information Commissioner’s Office at Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. www.ico.org.uk or call on 0303 123 1113